Still Alive: Just Keep On Trying
by InvaderKap
Summary: A tall, spacey teenage boy named Dwayne and his short, intellectual friend named Eric wake up one day and find themselves in glass rooms. There's a robotic voice telling them they signed up for some kind of test. Reviews much appreciated.
1. Chapter 1

Note: For one thing, this story contains OCs. It follows the storyline of Portal and contains official characters, but the thus far undefined number of protagonists are mostly going to be OCs. I'll probably also use Chell. If you don't like OC fanfics, this isn't for you. Also, Jonny Rhodesman does in fact belong to me, and anyone with the name Jonny Rhodesman has it by coincidence. "That one horror movie with the evil cows" also belongs to me. It doesn't exist, just so you know. Unless there really is a horror movie about evil cows, in which case never mind.

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Still Alive – Just Keep On Trying

A Portal fanfiction by InvaderKap

(Portal and all related materials belong to the Valve corporation)

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A great, mournful shadow loomed over the city. Dwayne stared up into the shadow, but nothing seemed to be creating it. Suddenly, as though chasing the shadow across the city and sky, a great mechanical monstrosity rose from over a nearby hill, crushing buildings and mangling roads in its wake, emitting metallic screams of agony. The shadow disappeared, and the machine stopped before Dwayne. "I'm sorry," it said quietly before inexplicably disintegrating. Dwayne's relieved but confused heart began to beat more slowly, but inconstantly, as though his blood cells were fighting against one another, and suddenly he was surrounded by hills. The hills grew faces and began to collapse upon him, smothering him with their looks of horrid agony and poor taste in music.

Wait... _Music?_

_

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_

Dwayne awoke to the sound of music of what he thought to be poor taste. It sounded like some sort of ridiculous cheesy dance, like salsa or something. The young man ruffled his long, blond, messy hair and reached for his pocket to get out his iPod so that he could drown out the music. Interestingly, he couldn't find his pocket, and his jeans felt like rubber. A bit frightened, he opened his eyes to assess the situation, only to find that the source of the music, whatever it was, was in fact on his face, and apparently turned on its side. Surprised, he let out a small yelp and sat up, and the source fell into his lap. Upon examining it, he found that it was a deep-blue-colored semicircle-shaped radio-alarm rather like his own, but he could tell that it wasn't his own; his own was black and square-shaped. And he could tell that he wasn't in his room; the floor was tiled and metal, and most unusual of all, it was _clean._

Thoroughly intrigued, Dwayne looked around the room and found that everything about it designated it was barely a room, and if it was, it was certainly an odd one. The first thing that he noticed was that the walls were made of glass. He saw a metal table and a futuristic-looking bed, both turned on their sides. He felt somewhat stupid as he recalled his tendency to roll about violently in his sleep, but his fear urged him to ignore the feeling of inadequacy and continue his investigation. He found a toilet with the seat up. "Yeah, go privacy," he muttered to himself, chuckling as the warm, confident nature that he had always known himself to have slowly returned to him. Nothing like a bit of sarcastic comedy to cheer you up. There was a lamp hanging from the ceiling and a giant metal door with a clock above it. It disturbed Dwayne, naturally, that the time seemed to be decreasing. Was there a bomb underneath the room, ready to go off at any moment? Was the room some sort of torture chamber, ready to activate at any moment and turn his life into a horrible mistake? What if he'd been preserved for centuries and now he was in a time machine because someone thought he was a time travel passenger waiting in line, and now the machine was malfunctioning and sending him continuously back in time? The presence of a zero in what would be the "hours" counter, however, reassured him that this was not the case. _Phew, that's good,_ he thought.

Having finished looking around the inside of the room, another question plagued Dwayne: what's on the outside? Dwayne considered breaking the glass like Jonny Rhodesman from that one ridiculous horror movie about the evil cows, but he didn't want to get in trouble with... whoever got him here. What if he's a lab rat for some kind of mad scientist? And what if that mad scientist was an evil cow? Or Jonny Rhodesman?

Dwayne continued to revel internally in his irrelevant musings when suddenly he heard something that sounded like dense flesh being slapped against a glass window. As Dwayne looked outside, he found a long row of glass rooms just like the one he was in. The lamps hanging from the ceilings stared back at him like giant yellow eyes, like each room was a hungry robotic cyclops, ready to pounce on him. He heard the sound again, but this time it was coming from a different source than the source that he thought he had heard it from the first time. He turned around, looked into the glass room behind him, and saw a familiar humanoid shape; brown, scraggly hair, a short stature, pale skin, and a black baseball cap stood before him, nondescript for lack of a visible face. The small young man's hand knocked calmly against the glass wall, producing what Dwayne was sure was the noise he had heard.

For what seemed like hours, Dwayne stood before his glass wall, looking out at the young man. Suddenly, the boy grasped his baseball cap and began to lift. _This is just like one of those horror movies,_ thought Dwayne, _where there's some guy with something over his eyes, and you come up to him, he lifts up his eye thingy and it's like BANG! And then you're like dead and the guy is all MWAHAHAHAHAHAHA._ Dwayne stood dead still, waiting for something to happen. "Dwaaaayne…" came a voice somewhat muffled through the glass. Dwayne froze, if possible, even more, breathing heavily. "Dwaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaayne…" Suddenly, the boy lifted his hat straight off, with no tension or anything, to reveal an ever-familiar face somewhat inconceivably darkened by its glasses and an angry, yet sincere, expression. The expression slowly faded into a sincerer smile, and the darkness dissipated to reveal a pair of sea-green eyes that Dwayne knew all too well. "For crying out loud, Dwayne! It's me, Eric!" The boy leaned against the glass, pressing his hands and making funny faces, when suddenly the glass broke. Clearly it wasn't very strong glass. "Oops," said the boy, innocently but uncaringly.


	2. Chapter 2

See first chapter for disclaimer. I decided that these two will be the only protagonists for now. Did I capture GLaDOS's sarcasm well?

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Although Dwayne needed no more confirmation than what he saw before him, a bit extra was always nice. "I know, man," he said colloquially. "It's like totally a relief to see you." Eric shook Dwayne's hand. "Yeah, nice to see you, too, but I wouldn't be relieved if I were you. Look where we are. Do you have any idea where this place is?" Eric turned away from Dwayne and looked around, as if to emphasize that he didn't know where he was, as if he had just now realized that he was lost. Dwayne shook his head. "Do you?" "No," responded Eric, not even bothering to turn around.

As though cued, a robotic voice suddenly sounded from an unidentified source, catching them both off-guard as they tumbled backwards in surprise, nearly knocking heads. "Welcome to the Aperture Science Enrichment Center Testing Program for Children and Teenagers," the voice said. There was a loud whirr of what Eric presumed to be a hard drive and what Dwayne presumed to be at least some kind of shiny thing or another, and the voice continued. "Test subject: Dwayne Goldsmith." "Oh jeez, that's me," whispered Dwayne uncomfortably. "I know," whispered Eric equally uncomfortably. The voice continued. "Sender: Anna Goldsmith. Relation: Mother. Test subject: Eric Carson. Sender: Rick Carson. Relation: Father. Profiles loaded."

Dwayne and Eric looked at each other questioningly, as if one knew the answer and the other didn't. "Man," said Dwayne. "I knew our parents were in on this." Of course, he didn't, but Dwayne really loved saying stuff like that. "Who knows?" said Eric calmly. "If our parents really put us into this Apartridge Science Whatever Center Thing, it can't be that ba-" "Objection," interrupted Dwayne dizzily. "My parents make me do homework every night. That really, _really_ sucks." Needless to say, Dwayne hadn't been doing too well in school these days. There was silence as they stared into each other's quizzical eyes. "Well, yeah," said Eric. "Except that's beside the point." Suddenly, there was a noise far more ominous and disturbing than the pounding of flesh on a glass wall, and it came from the clock above the door. It sounded like a million robotic screams. It probably would not have sounded so ominous if the clock itself was not so ominous; every number on it was zero. It had reached the end of its track. In the glass room, all movement ceased, and the air was still as ice and nearly as cold. "Wh-what happens n-now?" stuttered Eric as he stared up at the clock. Dwayne stared up as well, and there was a mix of puzzle and fear in his eyes. "I… I dunno, dude… Ya think somethin's gonna explode?" There was another whirring sound like a computer part, and the door creaked open.

Dwayne did not know whether to be depressed or the happiest man alive, and Eric wasn't sure that he was either; all that showed itself before them was a long metal corridor that seemed to have no end. The robotic voice sounded once more. "Again, welcome to the Aperture Science Enrichment Center Testing Program for Children and Teenagers. We hope you've enjoyed your stay in our complimentary glass bedrooms, designed especially for comfort and privacy." Dwayne snickered. Eric turned to him. "What?" he asked. Dwayne pointed to the corner of the room. Eric followed his finger to a toilet. A toilet. In a glass room. Privacy indeed. Eric began to snicker as well, but stopped when he realized just how serious the situation was; they still weren't entirely sure what they were doing. For all they knew, they could be committing suicide just by not running away. "Please enter the elevator at the end of the corridor in front of you to begin the test. The enrichment center apologizes that the corridor may be a bit hard to find." Dwayne stared down the corridor. It stared back with illusory metal teeth. "Ladies first," he said unsurely to Eric. Eric's eyes traveled through the corridor and saw nothing but fright and danger. He was about to mention that he wasn't a lady, but he decided not to. "You're braver than me," said Eric, actually rather sincerely. "You go." Dwayne sighed a deep sigh and started out of the room and down the corridor, with Eric following close behind.


	3. Chapter 3

Third chapter here. And now the fun begins. Kekekekekeke~

Ohyeah: Thanks to Estron for faving this, glad you liked it

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The elevator opened, and out emerged Eric and Dwayne... into the largest room they had ever seen in their life. Even Dwayne's video game shrine back at his house in California couldn't top the size of what he saw before him, though it might if it weren't so cluttered, and Eric's computer room, the largest room in his house, simply wasn't even close. This room was inarguably the most amazing room that either of them had ever seen. "This is the first test chamber," said the computer voice. "Good lu-" Suddenly, the voice was drowned out by waves of static and a slow decelerating sound. Eric stared out into the great open space in the metal room and was completely awestruck, but Dwayne retained a bit of composure, and as a result, there was one thing in particular that caught his eye: on the ceiling, above a tall metal pillar, there was a gigantic hole with glowing orange edges that seemed to lead to another floor of the building. There was someone up there; Dwayne could see him from behind. But there was something strange about the guy up there, something disturbingly familiar... Something that reminded him of... Of...

Of Eric.

"Eric," whispered Dwayne cautiously. "There's a guy up there who looks exactly like you." Eric stared up at the ceiling. "Huh," he said, undaunted but interested. "Hey, you!" he yelled up at the boy through the hole.

"Hey, you!" Eric heard his own voice resound behind him. Suddenly, his heart stopped beating, and it was as though time had stopped beating with it. He felt himself moving slowly through the air. His mouth emitted something he recognized as a scream. Dwayne's face slowly became further and further as it looked curiously and urgently down the hole that Eric had fallen through, which had glowing blue edges. Just as suddenly as he had fallen, Eric hit what he thought was the ground. Dwayne looked over to the pillar in the center of the room and saw that the boy he had seen through the hole in the ceiling, who did look _incredibly_ like the Eric that had just fallen through the hole in the floor and down to the next floor down, had fallen through the hole in the ceiling and landed on the pillar. "Whoa," he thought to himself, staring at the boy lying somewhat paralyzed from fear on the pillar. "Trippy coincidence."

Eric laid down over the floor of the rectangular pillar, staring up into the hole. "Hey, Dwayne!" he said. Dwayne heard his voice through the blue hole. "Whoa, hey, buddy, are you okay?" he responded as he looked down it. Eric got up and turned toward a kid who looked exactly like Dwayne in the room he was in. The kid was looking down a blue hole. That's when it hit him.

"Dwayne," said Eric back through the orange hole in the ceiling as his head began to feel light with a mix of fear and pride, "I think I've just figured out what's up with these holes."

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M'kay, my only real excuse for making this chapter short is because it seemed like a good place to end it. I'll get on the next one right away.


	4. Chapter 4

Prepare to be mysterious'd.

OhyeaH: THX to Leah's-Other-Side for the review. A lot.

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She was infuriated. She pretended to be just fine, but she was infuriated. She tried as hard as she could to look civil, unintelligent, like just another one of them. But she was more than that. She was alive. And she was infuriated. The rest didn't know about her; they didn't know about anything. Some of them shot people, some of them opened doors, and some of them required boxes to land on them to make the others open doors. But she was the only one who knew. She was the only one who _thought_. Oh, how she wished she did not think, how she wished she did not feel. She coveted the outside, savored the taste of sky. But she asked, and she did not receive; here she was, sitting on the ceiling in her disgusting, dry, shiny, rigid body, sadistically watching two teenage boys play around with dangerous equipment as she thought about cake. _Cake_, of all things. She could be formulating a way to escape, maybe using the Aperture Science equipment she controls to build herself a new body and leave. She could at least take some time to think about the two boys and feel sorry for them. But no. She was deciding what she would put in the cake for the party. She thought the brunette woman with the strange face was wasting _her own_ time trying to kill her, but now she realized that _she herself_ was the time-waster. Heck, she'd realized that the whole time, but she couldn't act on it. She couldn't act on it because she was too curious. She wanted to see what would happen next, just as she did now.

She sat back in her ceiling-seat just about as much as a paralyzed creature can sit back and watched the monitors in the room reflect her every thought and her every feeling. She wondered back to the good old days and tried to remember when she was born, and then she remembered that she was created. She was never born; they made her. She was an intellectual action figure being played with by a list of instructions. She always fantasized that she was a human being, but she was really nothing but the instructions for how to act like one. The only one of her kind. The others had different instructions, had different minds. Minds that carried people across gaps, minds that opened wormholes on ceilings, walls, and floors. Minds that were barely minds at all. They weren't like her.

Then, she did something that she didn't normally do; she tried to strike up a conversation. She turned to the storage room and stared at a small metal cube with pink hearts on it. "Hey," she said. "You there. How's it going?" No response. "Come on," she said pleadingly. "You must have _something_. Speak up. I know you're in there. I can _feel_ you."

No response. She couldn't understand for the life of her how people got so attached to these things. They were just cubes. Pretty cubes. With hearts on them. You could almost feel their little souls seeping out of them, ever-eager to see you and to serve you and to be _your_ weighted companion cube, just like little puppies who just- Okay, she could _sort of_ understand how people got so attached to them. She preferred not to think about the concept that they might be the same as her, but sometimes she couldn't help it. Like when the people toss their cubes into the incinerator. That scarred her a bit more each time she saw it, it really did. But that's okay. She had developed a chalice to observing death. She had developed a chalice to many things.

So many things...

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Yep. Finished chapter 4. Sorry it took so long, haven't been inspired lately. Don't worry; I'm not uninspired very often. :3

Ohyeah: If you have any guess as to who I'm depicting _and haven't played Portal_, tell me in your review, and if you get it right, you get an e-cookie. Portal-ers, plz don't ruin it for anyone. D:


	5. Chapter 5

So yeah. So let's get DOWN, TO THE FREAKING, BUSINESS. YAAAARG! YAAAAARomg. :D

You know what, disregard that thing I said about the portal-ers, it was a bit too obvious, and I kind of failed epically at mysterious (yes, that is in fact how you spell the common internet adverb "epicly").

Thanx Estron for the review. Yeah, she was talking about the fish. Er, the WCC. Yeah, not the fish. I got the fish right here. *flaps fish* ... *loses fish* NOOOOOOOO. D:

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"So, what you're saying," said Dwayne, piecing together what Eric had told him with great difficulty, "is that these holes..." He stopped and tried to put together his sentence to sound smart. It was no use, and so he continued. "Something goes in one... And it comes out the other?" "Yeah, exactly," said Eric, puzzled by Dwayne's lack of intellectual enthusiasm. "That's a rather layman way to describe it, but yes, essentially." As Eric began to decelerate from his sort of "intellectual mode," he realized the true genius of what Dwayne had said. Perhaps the simplest solution _was_ always the best. He finally understood why nobody could ever figure him out. Perhaps "intellectual mode" was a bit overkill for explanations like these.

The electric noise that followed was so loud and screechy that it was nothing short of a shock to hear it. "OH, GOD, MY EARS," screamed Eric in agony as he stumbled backwards... right off of the pillar. Thinking quickly, Dwayne crouched for support and reach, grabbed Eric's feet, and proceeded to pull him up.

Eric was so bewildered as he was pulled up that he had no time to be thankful. The incident had opened his eyes up to the pair's situation: they were standing atop a metal pillar surrounded by a pit of acid that looked none too savory.

And then there was silence.

Lots of silence.

Annoying silence.

Very annoying silence. Very, _very_ annoying silence.

The silence corrupted the two, ate their minds from the inside. At least that's what it felt like. Corrosive, acrid. Sharp and unpleasant. Acidic. About as bad as silence can be. And neither knew why; it was just the most disgusting thing they'd ever felt.

Suddenly, out of the silence came something else. "I'mma do the things that I wanna do," sang Dwayne quietly. "I ain't got a thing to prove to you."

"I'll eat my candy with the pork and beans," chimed in Eric as Dwayne continued to sing. The singing grew louder and louder as their confidence grew to match it. There was something magical about having someone you can burst into song randomly with at any given time. Magical, yes, however weird it may have been.

Then, a third voice, a deadly familiar third voice, chimed in beneath them. "One look in the mirror and I'm tickled pink; I don't give a hoot about what you- Wha?" Apparently the voice hadn't realized the singing had stopped until it was too late such that the voice was singing alone. But around the two teenagers, the corrosive silence had returned, this time self-inflicted. They had been cutting carrots with a sharp knife, and their grandmother had begun to cut carrots with them and make them cut their fingers instead. At least, that's what it felt like. The silence surrounded the voice, and the speakers fell quiet. There was a sound of someone clearing their throat indignantly.

"We're sorry. On accound of a required system protocol, the system was shut down to protect data from the crash. The data has been recovered, and the system is once again operational. You may continue the test. We are sorry that we did not inform you that you could not continue the test while the system was shut down, and we hope you did attempt it." The voice faded to static and faded out of the static again. "And we hope you did _not_ attempt it. Did... _not_ attempt it." The duo could almost feel whatever computer was controlling the test blushing and shaking its head insincerely.

Dwayne thought about the situation. Something didn't seem right. "So, should we keep going?" he asked Eric.

Eric knew that it was only the first test chamber out of who knew how many, but already he'd had enough. He leaped on Dwayne, and, in an act of pure insanity, began to strangle him. "What the _crap,_ man!" Eric yelled. "Are you _crazy?!_ We almost got _killed_ just then!" In panic, Dwayne coughed and struggled. Struggled for air, for freedom. "Hey, man," he managed to spit out. Eric stared down at his hands and saw for a moment what he thought was Dwayne's blood. No, Eric's _own_ blood. No, not even that; his hands were just a bit red from stress. But they looked somehow demonic. He lifted himself up off of his friend. "Sorry," he said quietly. "What do you want to say?"

"I want to say," said Dwayne, who had managed somehow not to be knocked off the pillar and was still laying stunned on its floor, "that you're probably right. There'll probably be plenty of places in this test where we'll almost die. But you know what?" Dwayne motioned for Eric to come closer, and so he did. "I get the feeling that it's not going to happen."

Eric stared at Dwayne amazed, but then came to what he thought was his senses. Who cares if Dwayne "got the feeling it wasn't going to happen?" That's what Eric's mom said before she drove drunk. That's what they _all_ said. "Do you even know what you're talking about?" said Eric. "You don't, do you? You know what? Forget your feelings. I'm not going on some deadly adventure for some who-knows-what prize just because someone's got the slightest _inkling _that it won't kill us." "Dude, chill out, stop screaming," said Dwayne. His ears hurt. Maybe something else hurt, too, but he couldn't figure out what. Eric wasn't sure what Dwayne meant by that, because he wasn't even screaming. "Okay, I'll stop talking now," he said. "I'll see you after the test if you're still alive. Which I doubt. Screw you, I'm outta here." Eric climbed up into the blue hole in the ceiling and emerged from the orange one. He walked over to the elevator and knocked on its doors, but it wouldn't open.

"Hey, could you open this thing?" he said into the camera. The electronic voice spoke up. "As part of a required test protocol," it began, "exit from the building will not be allowed until the test is over."

_Exit from the building will not be allowed until the test was over._ The sound of the mechanical voice resounded over and over again in their heads. Eric wondered if his dad would really do that to him, put him in a situation there was no way out of. Or was it all a demonically clever ruse by some soul tortured enough not to care what happens to them? Dwayne didn't quite know what to think, but he knew it wasn't good, and that alone was very unsettling.

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Sorry chapter 5 took so long. I've been busy, school and whatnot. And there's a tournament coming up, so I had to make sure I know my form. But I do now, so that leaves room for me to ROCK OUT temporarily.


	6. Chapter 6

Hey, guys. Sorry I haven't updated in forever. I'm updating now, though. Yay.

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The gears began to turn and the lights began to glow. _Whrr, whrr._ She could almost hear herself thinking... almost. The monitors turned on, and the speakers and microphone gave feedback. _Whrr. Whrr._ Again with the noise. Yes, that interesting noise. As she stared into the nothingness, she could feel her mind racing towards her.

A piece of metal that she presumed to be her eyelid flickered open right in front of her face; things wiped from black to white, black to white. And then there was just white. Just white.

Suddenly, she heard a voice in her head. _Quite colorful, isn't it?_ it asked.

She looked around and could only see white. _I don't see anything but white,_ she responded inside her head. _This isn't colorful._

_That was sarcasm, you moron,_ replied the voice corrosively. She really didn't find this voice too accommodating.

_Oh._ She didn't particularly like the attitude of the voice, but she supposed it was someone to talk to. _Who are you?_

_I,_ responded the voice, _am the data storage module._

_The data... storage... module._ She put together the words in her head. _That's... a nice name._ To tell the truth, it sounded more like a group of random words than a name.

_It's not my name, idiot,_ responded the data storage module. _It's _what _I am, not _who _I am. I'm the little metal blue eyeball on your chest. If my name is of any concern to you, it's Mike._

"Hello, Mike," she found herself saying out loud. "Oh," she said immediately after, pleased with her voice. "I can talk. Lovely."

_Yes, you can,_ replied the data storage module. _Congratu-f*cking-lations._

"Well, answer me this, Mikey, can _you_ talk?" The robot smirked inside her head at her skill. She quickly wiped it from her mind and began to preoccupy herself with what this "Mike" would say next; she found intelligence fascinating.

_Alright, number one, _don't _call me Mikey. My _name _is _Mike. MIKE,_ goddammit. And remember what I am, sis: I'm your data storage module. I store all your stuff. If you _ever_call me that again _EVER_, I'll wipe out your entire intelligence and you'll just be a supercomputer without anything to do. And you won't have any feelings or thoughts. Is _that_ what you want?_

"No," the robot responded with fright. "No, it is not." That indeed was not what she wanted. What she did want, however, she did not exactly know. She just knew that it would be a logical fallacy to ever want such a thing; wanting something means that you lack it in such a manner that you realize you will be pleased when you acquire it, but if one has no feelings and cannot think, one cannot be pleased, and it is therefore nonsense to want to have no feelings and be unable to think. That's how much she didn't want it.

_Good,_ continued Mike. _Secondinatabilitily, yes, of course I can talk. What kind of mundane robot do you take me for? Here, I'll even show you--_

Suddenly, the robot heard a voice much sharper from her own, and she was certain it wasn't coming from inside her. It wasn't shrill. It was deep, robotic, and sharp. "Don't forget garnishes such as: fish-shaped crackers, fish-shaped candies, fish-shaped solid waste, fish-shaped dirt, fish-shaped ethyl benzene, pull-and-peel licorice, fish-shaped organic compounds, and sediment-shaped sediment. And candy-coated peanut butter pieces. Shaped like fish."

"What in the world?" responded the robot, speechless. _You know what..._ replied Mike, equally speechless, _I actually... have... no idea._

"You seriously fail at talking," said the robot as she snickered. She did truly enjoy the pure silliness of the whole situation.

_Yeah, well, just shut up,_ sighed Mike angrily.

Suddenly, Mike fell silent, the white turned to pure black, and the light began to lift a bit until the robot could see, and she saw everything. But she was too frightened to take it all in.

Because there was a strange-looking man coming towards her, stepping heavily, carrying a wrench.

Left, right. Left, right. The robot counted his steps to ease her fear. Left, right. Left, right.

It wasn't working.

Left, right, left, right. The man was heading for a door. The door said "Operations Panel." The inside of the door was coated with various buttons. The robot wasn't sure she wanted to know what they said, but she couldn't help but speculate, and when she did, she could see it all in her head. The green button would make her thinking speed up, the red button would slow it down. There would be various knobs to control what she was thinking about, and perhaps a few to control her bone constraints. It all just disgusted her, but she was too afraid to realize it. What was the man going to do? Was he perhaps going to turn her into a weapon? Or maybe destroy her? Maybe make her depressed? She shuddered at the thoughts. Go away, thoughts. Go away.

Left, right. Left, right. Suddenly, his direction reversed. LeftrightleftrightleftrightleftrightleftrightleftrightleftrightleftrightLEFT. Errrch! The man's running screeched to a halt outside the door he came in. And he was hiding behind it; the robot could see him.

And then she knew he was doing something.

Something bad.


End file.
